The group stood before the apartment building. It, like the rest of the city around it, bled of impoverishment and dirtiness.

They were currently somewhere on the tarnished surface of 'Gurakku'. This was a world still under limited Infinity rule... despite the fact that the Corporation had already been toppled.

Stephen had gotten word of this situation from an old ally in the form of an elder Dragon by the name of Daervis. Acting on his word, Stephen gathered a group of Enlil, Intemera, Argus, James, Griff, and Keir. Utilizing James' airship the 'Lightning Bolt' they have come to this planet, and despite some stumbles in landing the ship and passing through the city, they are near the purported Infinity base - the splinter faction. But first they must meet with Daervis, to learn more of the situation.

As luck would have it, he resides in an apartment building only a mile or so from the base...

That was all before.. this is now..

***

Stephen scowled at the apartment building as it was. It was plainly obvious to the group, from their observations before, that the building was in a bad state. None of them necessarily needed to comment.

Rather, the issue came to actually entering the apartment building or not. Stephen gave each of his companions a brief moment of thought before giving each of them an eye.

"So. Does anyone wish to wait out here? I can easily meet Daervis by myself, you should realize."

Argus looked over at Stephan as well. "I'd like to meet this guy. If I'm risking my life here I would like to know all the details." Saying this he waited for the rest of the group to make their decision's

Griff crossed his arms and gave the building another look-over. He didn't trust old, delapidated buildings, but at the same time, he didn't trust a damned thing on this world. Thinking about it a minute, he finally responded.

Stephen glanced at Keir and James as they spoke, respectively, before nodding silently and turning to the apartment building.

"Don't hesitate to enter.. if you should need us." The dragonoid informed Intemera.. before stepping towards the front door, opening it, and leading the others inward.

Well, the door didn't quite 'open' so much as 'fall off of its hinges'. A slight sigh and Stephen led them into what one may describe as the 'lobby'.

Said lobby was a dank, dark room. Sure, one could see various decals* about the room that were most likely intended to give the room a comfortable image: a plush red rug that covered the entirety of the room, engraved wooden walls and ceiling, a delicately refined chandelier hanging from the ceiling, and various furniture of sorts set here and there, for comfort of any potential visitors.

Well, all of these items were now covered with a fair coating of grime and dirt. The rug was oddly.. squishy to step on. The walls and ceiling were filled with various small holes. Several of these holes could presumably have been bullet holes. Others were larger..
The chandelier appeared to be silently shedding glass on each passing moment. The furniture.. well, it looked dirty, but it looked fine beyond that.

There was a flight of stairs leading upward at the very back of the room. Next to this flight of stairs was a counter on which a humanoid of some sort had its head slumped. Behind this humanoid was a series of compartments, most closed, a few opened. Presumably for mail. All covered in the same layer of grime.

Next to the counter, finally, was a closed door. It, oddly, had none of the dirtiness of the rest of the room -it was very clean. Almost sparkling, in spite of the rest of the room.

Stephen hmmed and looked around the room briefly. "Feel free to explore around here for a moment." He seemed to be looking towards the compartments behind the humanoid. "I have something to check on."

And so he walked towards said counter, leaving Enlil, Griff, Argus, James, and Keir room to explore and get into shenanigans!

Enlil wanted to talk with the person at the counter, but she wasn't sure if that was a good idea, given that Stephen was eyeing the mail slots. It may be best to simple let the man rest until Stephen was done.

So until then, she simply waited, and made sure that no one else was doing something that endangered anything particularly.

Griff simply looked over the room, walking around a bit to get a feel for things and adjust himself suitably to its feel. Taking it all in slowly, he finally eyed the counter, and the person slumped on it, as a single thought ran through his head....

Argus looked over the room quickly, his eyes stopped on the shiny door. Of course usually he would walk right on over to it and peek in, but he wasn't alone so he didn't want to get the group in trouble. He walked over to one of the various chairs, and sat himself down. However he couldn't keep it to himself, so he calmly asked his companions the question.

As Argus sat down on one of the chairs, he heard a bit of skittering. A close bit of examination would reveal a number of bugs escaping their once untrifled place of rest.. the chair that he had been sitting on.. and off to dominate another piece of vile upholstery. Those wacky bugs.

Stephen went to work investigating the mail slots, paying little mind to the humanoid, Griff's comment, or anything else. He seemed to be pulling out multiple envelopes.. and tearing them all open. Not one for privacy, this Stephen! Not even as he read each and every letter, notice, bill.. tossing each to the ground as he finished reading each.

Argus looked down as the bugs skittered off. He stood up getting off the chair. "Sheesh.... didn't expect anything to live in a chair like that..." He shrugged before crossing his arms over his chest and letting out a huff. He didn't say anything else, although he glanced at the Shiny door every now and then.

The door didn't concern Enlil as much as the others. They would investigate it when it was time. Rather, it was the letters being cast aside that interests her. Following Stephen, she helps herself to a few of the cast off letters, looking through them.

The letters themselves were impossible to read: they were all printed in some sort of obscure language that represented the Infinity language she had seen so much a few months back. Most of the letters seemed to bear the logo of Infinity as a portion of the border. Business letter, perhaps?

Stephen continued to look through the letters briefly before looking to Enlil, throwing a few more to the ground. "I'm trying to find a letter directed towards Daervis. It seems as if there is at least one letter for every compartment, here, so the odds that I will find a letter intended for him will at least be.."

He paused upon one letter, eyeing it briefly. He turned back to the cast off envelope and inspected it as well. He seemed to nod briefly.. before setting the envelope aside again and placing the letter down on the counter to read. He pushed the humanoid out of the chair.. who fell to the ground with a slump. Apparently, the humanoid was dead.. or deep asleep. Either way, he did not mind Stephen stealing his seat.

Stephen gave Enlil the barest of glances. "Here we go." is all he said, before he began to read the letter, which looked much the same, in format, to Enlil as all of the others did.

The chandelier above Keir continued to silently shed a bit of glass every passing moment. It, of course, was dirty.. barely giving off any light for the room. It was essentially useless, and an eyesore.. yet it was their only source of light. How charming.

Keir shakes his head a bit, and looks over to James...and then to Argus. He opens his mouth as if about to say something, before quickly closing it and turning his head. He then turns to Griff. What could be holding his attention so well? One of life's little mysteries, he supposes.

Griff watched as the man slumped over. Dead, or dead tired, Griff didn't care. He just wanted to get this done with as soon as he could. Looking at Argus's choice to sit, he decided he'd rather stand, and tried his best to attempt to figure out what kind of wood that counter was made of. Walking to the series of discarded letters, he simply looked over them, not expecting to be able to read them but it at least gave him something to look at for the time being, as he waited for the next move to be made.

Griff's observation of the letters led him to the conclusion.. that he had no fucking idea what was written on them. All were in some form of mindfucking written language that he could make neither heads nor tails of.

Enlil's observation of the man led her to the conclusion that he was dead. The fine layer of dust that had permeated his skin may have been a tipoff, but the fact that there were a bullet holes on each side of the head also gave her this hunch. James' scanning revealed.. something. A small dollop of life, within what was apparently the gut of the man. While he could not be sure what this 'dollop' was at present point, it was rather dissimilar from the rest of the man's structure.

The shiny door, meanwhile, continued to shine. Shine shine shine. It may have reminded Argus of a fine layer of oils on flesh.

As this went on, Stephen continued to read the letter, taking a few pauses to make invisible notes on the counter with a claw or two. Although it wasn't clear why he was doing this, he probably had a purpose. A mysterious purpose!

***

Meanwhile, Intemera was apparently keeping her stand outside, in the city with admittedly low property value. Nothing much was happening at this point.. the city was in the throws of night. Well, beyond the crime rate..

The angel sighed, pondering who might have done this. Though the sight of murder was no longer as shocking to her as it was in her younger days, it still hurt deeply to think of the potential that had been wasted, and the darkness that had been perpetuated through it. She offered a silent prayer to the departed's soul, then stood again

"Perhaps it would be best just to leave his mail alone find whom we seek now, before something else awful happens."

There was no immediate reply to Intemera's raised voice. Rather, there was a momentual pausing of footsteps.

... a slight moment passed before a deep 'fsssssshhhhhttt' sound filled the air of the city, and while the area had not changed visually, Intemera could definitely smell a rather.. inoffensive odor wafting into the air around her. Odd..

***

Stephen finished, setting the letter down. "Well, then. According to this letter.. Daervis has had some form of Infinity chip installed into his form. Making it better, its malfunctioning is what is causing his apparent ailment.

Stephen nodded... and swiftly began to walk toward the stairs, apparently ignoring Keir, James, Argus, and the Intemera that was still outside.

An odd sort of determination took him as he began to climb upward. It was the discretion of the others as to what they were to do from this point on.

***

Further observation of the 'gas' outside would reveal it to be somewhat thick in spite of the air of the city. There was something about it that seemed to combat at Intemera's strength as she stood there, still.

As this happened, she would bear witness to some sort of.. smallish figure, bearing what seemed to be a combustive grenade of sorts, running off from her right to the apparent direction of the Infinity Corporation.

Intemera felt herself growing weaker. She knew she wouldn't be able to stand it much longer. So she slipped open the door (which she had so presciently gone towards before), let herself in, and closed it hurriedly.